Visitor: I take it you didn’t have the stern and upright leaders, what we call the Serious People, who could set an example by donning Velcro shoes themselves?
From Ratatouille:
In many ways, the work of a critic is easy. We risk very little, yet enjoy a position over those who offer up their work and their selves to our judgment. We thrive on negative criticism, which is fun to write and to read. But the bitter truth we critics must face, is that in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is probably more meaningful than our criticism designating it so. But there are times when a critic truly risks something, and that is in the discovery and defense of the new. The world is often unkind to new talent, new creations. The new needs friends.
And that’s why bravery is the secret name of the nameless virtue, and seriously underrated.
[[To elaborate slightly: to go beyond pointing and sneering, to actually work to construct a better future, is very difficult. It requires breaking from social conventions, not just the social conventions you claim are “self evidently stupid” but also the ones you see as natural and right. In many ways the hardest task is not to realise what the “right choice” is, but to choose cooperate in face of your knowledge of nash equilibria.
To reach for the pareto optimal solution to a coordination game means knowing you might very well be stabbed in the back. In a world where inadequate equilibria persist the only way we get out is to be the first person to break those equilibria, and that requires you to take some pretty locally irrational actions. Sometimes choosing not to defect or to punish requires unimaginable bravery. Mere knowledge of Moloch does not save you from Moloch, only action does.]]
From Inadequate Equilibria:
Visitor: I take it you didn’t have the stern and upright leaders, what we call the Serious People, who could set an example by donning Velcro shoes themselves?
From Ratatouille:
In many ways, the work of a critic is easy. We risk very little, yet enjoy a position over those who offer up their work and their selves to our judgment. We thrive on negative criticism, which is fun to write and to read. But the bitter truth we critics must face, is that in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is probably more meaningful than our criticism designating it so. But there are times when a critic truly risks something, and that is in the discovery and defense of the new. The world is often unkind to new talent, new creations. The new needs friends.
And that’s why bravery is the secret name of the nameless virtue, and seriously underrated.
[[To elaborate slightly: to go beyond pointing and sneering, to actually work to construct a better future, is very difficult. It requires breaking from social conventions, not just the social conventions you claim are “self evidently stupid” but also the ones you see as natural and right. In many ways the hardest task is not to realise what the “right choice” is, but to choose cooperate in face of your knowledge of nash equilibria.
To reach for the pareto optimal solution to a coordination game means knowing you might very well be stabbed in the back. In a world where inadequate equilibria persist the only way we get out is to be the first person to break those equilibria, and that requires you to take some pretty locally irrational actions. Sometimes choosing not to defect or to punish requires unimaginable bravery. Mere knowledge of Moloch does not save you from Moloch, only action does.]]